


The Virtual Tarot Prevarication

by shydiva1996



Category: The Big Bang Theory (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-29
Updated: 2014-07-29
Packaged: 2018-02-10 23:44:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2044680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shydiva1996/pseuds/shydiva1996
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Penny discovers Peter Answers and decides to try it out on a certain physicist, yielding some unexpected results. Oneshot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Virtual Tarot Prevarication

Penny grinned devilishly as she wandered over to 4A. She knocked on the door.

“ _Oh, Sheldon_?” she sing-songed. Leonard was away at a conference of some sorts, so it was just Penny and her whackadoodle neighbour.

Sheldon opened the door, looking quite annoyed, as usual.

“Let me guess, you require the wi-fi password?” he inquired dryly.

“Nope, not this time,” Penny replied, bright smile still plastered on her face.

“Coffee?”  
“Jeez, Sheldon. Those aren’t the only two reasons that I visit here!”

He looked puzzled, as if questioning whether or not that was sarcasm. Penny rolled her eyes and lightly shoved him aside, walking over to the computer. “Come here, I want to show you something.”

Sheldon shut the door and followed her to his computer. “If it’s another one of those cat videos, then perish the thought.”

Penny sighed as she started typing in the web address. “No Sheldon, it’s not a cat video. Although those are adorable.”

“Well, whatever it is, as my mother would say, make it snappy. I’m currently working on a paper on Quantum Gravity for the physics lab, and I would like to have it finished sometime today, thank you,” he said as he pulled up a chair beside her.

“Yeah, yeah, keep your pants on, mister,” Penny muttered, and before he could retort with some horrified comment about why on earth he would choose _not_ to keep his trousers on him, the website appeared on the screen. Penny smiled darkly. Oh, this was going to be _priceless_.

Sheldon furrowed his eyebrows as he peered closely at the domain. “ ‘Peter Answers’?” he wondered. “Penny, this website is just laced with ambiguity. Who is this ‘Peter’? And what does he answer?”  
“Anything,” Penny answered with gleaming eyes. “Just ask him a question and he’ll tell you the answer, as long as it’s not about the future.”

“Drat!” Sheldon cried. Penny chuckled a bit. He had probably been thinking of asking some kind of future-related query, like if robots were going to rule society in the next century.

“Go on, think of a question,” Penny urged. Sheldon looked skeptical for a moment, but he finally gave in. “Why is the sky blue?” he asked.

“Seriously?” Penny deadpanned. “That’s what you wanna ask him?”

“Did you have something else in mind, Miss Cornhusker Community College?” he shot back.

Penny narrowed her eyes at him and resisted the urge to smack him over the head with the keyboard. _Inhale. Now release it. There._ “Fine. You make the calls, buster,” she conceded, and began typing. She pressed the period key before entering the petition to disguise her answer, then typed in the question: **Why is the sky blue?** She clicked OK, accepted the disclaimer, and waited for the answer to show up. Finally, a new text appeared below the spaces: **Because green was already taken string bean!**

Sheldon frowned. “Well, _that_ was uncalled for. And obviously this person never passed third grade English, as they are missing a substantial comma.”

She grinned at him, trying to ignore the insult. “But isn’t it cool, though? Go on, ask him another question. Make it personal. He’s _really_ accurate. It’s pretty freaky.”

He thought for a second. “Who is my favourite Star Trek character?”

Penny nodded. “You got it.” Suddenly her fingers froze over the keys. _Oh shit. Come on, Penny, he’s only mentioned it like a hundred thousand times! Aha!_ Penny rapidly typed in the petition/secret answer and then popped in the question. Soon, one word appeared underneath: **Spock.**

Now Sheldon looked slightly apprehensive. “But … but that’s … how can…”

Penny giggled. He was falling right into her trap. “What did I tell you? He’ll answer _anything_. Scary, huh? Go ahead, ask him something _more_ personal. I dare you.”

He quickly composed himself. “Yes, I’m fairly sure that was merely a coincidence. The shareholders of this website must somehow keep track of my search history on Google. Yes, that must be it. Hmm…” He thought about something else he could ask, then smirked, confident there was no way this “Peter” person would be able to answer correctly. “When is my birthday?”  
“Coming up.” She paused. _Balls._ “Um, when is your birthday again?” she asked as nonchalantly as she could, bracing herself for his usual mode of condescension.

 _Aaaand_ there it was. “ _Penny_ , while we can’t all be blessed with an eidetic memory, I would assume you are capable of at least remembering something as fundamental about myself as my date of birth. You know I am a Taurus, so that already narrows it down to April 20th to May 20th.”

“Oh wait! I remember now!” she shouted. She didn’t, actually, but she was hoping to find a way to squeeze it out of him. “It’s May 3rd, right?” _Please correct me, please correct me, please correct me._

Instead, Sheldon simply said, “No.” _No!_ He smiled triumphantly. “If you cannot remember something as simple as my birthday, then there is no possible way that this Peter individual will know any better.”

Penny was panicking. What now? Was she just going to have to guess and hope for a one in thirty chance? She bit her lip and looked around for anything, any gift or calendar or something that might be able to give her a clue.

“Penny?” Sheldon called, looking at his friend.

“Hmm?” Penny murmured, and looked at him. Sheldon gestured towards the computer. Penny sucked in a breath through her teeth and started typing. _Please, oh please, let me be right._ She pressed the OK button and waited anxiously. Finally, a date appeared: May 8th.

Sheldon paled. “That’s impossible…” he whispered, barely audible.

Penny gasped. “I got it? I mean, he got it? Wow! See, I told you! He knows everything!” Penny felt immense relief. Okay, from now on, she was picking the questions. “I know. Let’s ask if you have any siblings.”

“ _Must_ we bring my family into this?” Sheldon groaned.

Penny pouted. “Okay, fine. We won’t ask that. Oh! We haven’t even asked what your name is yet! Yeah, let’s do that.”

“But if they check my browser history, then that fact will be easy to find, considering I Google myself on a frequent basis.”

She rolled her eyes. “What a surprise! Whatever. Let’s just ask him.” Click, click, click. _Okay. Sheldon Lee Cooper._ She paused hesitantly. She could just give him the name, but she had the perfect supplementary comment to really pack a punch. The only problem was limited space. She decided to type it anyways, just to see the look on his face. She used up all the quota of words on the petition then kept writing, leaving a void of white space after the colon.

He frowned when he noticed that she was seemingly typing nothing. “Penny, why are you still typing? The petition is already filled.”

“Oh, um, it’s just a website problem,” she lied with a wave of her hand. “Sometimes you have to keep typing stuff, otherwise it won’t work.” She cringed at how ridiculous her excuse sounded. _Smooth, Penny, smooth._

However, Sheldon seemed to buy it. “Fair enough,” he shrugged. “Why are so many websites today just riddled with amateur errors? Honestly, I could do a far better job myself, not that I’d ever humble myself to such a menial job as computer programming…”

While Sheldon went off on yet another tangent, Penny finally finished typing her response and then wrote her question: **What is this man’s name?**

Soon, the answer came up: **Sheldon Lee Cooper. Who’s the know-it-all smartass now, string bean?**

Sheldon shot up from his chair. “This is a conspiracy! I refuse to believe that someone out there has a hold of all my information!”

Penny pressed a hand to her mouth to hide her laughing. She couldn’t believe Sheldon, of all people, was falling for this. For someone who had an IQ of 187, sometimes Sheldon Cooper was denser than a molecular cloud. “Let’s see…” Maybe she could really have some fun with this. She started typing again. “‘Does Sheldon Cooper have a crush on someone’?”

Sheldon sat back down and glared at her. “That is preposterous! I do not have a ‘crush’ on anyo-”

**Yes :)**

“Oh, yes you do,” Penny teased. “According to our good friend Peter. You like someone, Shelly.”

Heat rose to Sheldon’s face. “I most certainly do not!”

“Is that a blush on your cheeks, Moonpie?”

“No! And for the last time, Penny, only Mee-”

“Wait!” Penny stopped him. “Let’s see if Peter knows instead.” She typed out the “petition”, and then she typed in the question: **Who is the only person in the world that can call Sheldon Moonpie?**

Sheldon stared at the screen. “This one, he cannot possibly get.”

Soon, the answer appeared right in front of his eyes. **Why his Meemaw of course.**

It was like Sheldon had been frozen solid. “Dear lord.”

Penny smirked. Oh, if only she could record this somehow. She was sure the guys would get a kick out of his reaction.

 Minutes passed, and the questions kept getting more and more difficult.

**Petition: Peter, please answer the following question:**

**Question: At what temperature does Sheldon keep the thermostat?**

**Peter Answers: 72 degrees farinheight. A bit stuffy don’t you think Mr. Cooper?**

“A mere lucky guess! And that’s _Dr_. Cooper!” 

**Petition: Peter, please answer the following question:**

**Question: True or false. Sheldon likes the sound of whistling?**

**Peter Answers: FALSE!**

“Well, who does?!”

**Petition: Peter, please answer the following question:**

**Question: True or false. Sheldon Cooper is crazy?**

**Peter Answers: FALSE! His mother had him tested. Although she should really have him tested again. It might have been a fluke.**

“You’re damn right that’s false! And no, one test is more than sufficient!”

**Petition: Peter, please answer the following question:**

**Question: True or false. Sheldon has a pet?**

**Peter Answers: Trick question! He does not have a living breathing conventional pet at the moment, but he does own a Tamagotchi. Peter 10. Sheldon 0.**

“No!”

**Petition: Peter, please answer the following question:**

**Question: What does Sheldon order when we eat Chinese food (BE SPECIFIC!)?**

**Peter Answers: Chicken with broccoli diced not shredded even though the menu specifies shredded brown, not white rice accomppanied with the good hot mustard from the Korean grocery store and the low-sodium soy sauce from the market. Checkfrickenmate.**

Sheldon was twitching. Penny was surprised she was able to remember all of that. She supposed when you hear something over and over so many times, it becomes permanently stamped into your brain whether you like it or not. Sort of like a song getting stuck in your head. She was even more surprised she’d managed to spell everything correctly so far (well, mostly everything), considering she couldn’t even see what she was typing. Suddenly, Sheldon snapped back to normal. “Let me see this.” He grabbed the keyboard and swiped it towards him.

“Wait, Sheldon, don’t-” Penny started to protest, but he was already typing. “I’m going to get to the bottom of this,” Sheldon muttered as he concentrated on typing his question. “‘How do you know all of this information’?” He waited. “Now we’ll see what’s really going on.” His face moulded into a frown as the answer appeared before him:

**I can’t help you with this question.**

“Excuse me?” He typed out another question. “‘Are you a spy’?”

**I will tell you when you are ready.**

Sheldon’s blood was boiling. His fingers attacked the keyboard as he inserted another question **:** “‘How dare you mock me?’”

**Shhhhh.**

“ _Penny!_ ” Sheldon whined. “Why does he not answer me?”

“I guess he just doesn’t like you?” Penny weakly said with a sheepish smile.

“Sexist cretin,” Sheldon muttered, folding his arms. He looked over at the blonde with sudden realization. “Ask him if he is Leslie Winkle.”

Penny shook her head, amused, and typed in the credentials.

**Nope.**

“Ask if he is Wil Wheaton.”

**Noooo. Your getting colder string bean.**

Sheldon stared at her in astonishment. “ _Leonard_?”

Penny shrugged and typed in the question.

**Warmer, but not quite.**

“Wolowitz? Tell him that if he admits it, I will never judge him for his lack of qualifications again, as it does takes a copious amount of skill to be able to pull off something as devious as this.”

**No and I’m not raj amy or bernadette either so don’t go there.**

Sheldon looked like a lost child. Penny sighed quietly and looked at him. “Sheldon, isn’t there _anybody_ elsewho knows all this stuff? Someone who is close to you?” _Literally._

He thought about it. “Beverly Hofstadter? Though I doubt she would stoop to such infantile methods of amusement.”

Penny scoffed. _Really, Sheldon? How clueless are you?_

Suddenly Sheldon blanched as a possible theory crossed his mind. “Someone must be plotting to blackmail me! But for what?”

“Um, sweetie, I really don’t think knowing your thermostat setting is a good piece of information to blackmail you with.”

“Then a government sector must be placing me under close supervision because-” He gasped. “The secret military supercollider located beneath a fake agricultural station 12.5 miles south east of Travers City, Michigan!”

“Oh Sheldon, sweetie, I don’t think-”

He started running around the apartment looking for spyware. “Oh, who knows how long they’ve been observing me-”

“Sheldon, listen-”

“I’ll have to move somewhere else and change my name-”

“Sheldon-”

“Perhaps I’ll become a schoolteacher in Iowa. Oh, but what a shameful waste of my acumen, to be stuck in such a pedestrian position-”

“SHELDON!”

Startled, the frenzied man looked at Penny. “Sheldon, it was a joke,” she said.

He blinked.

She smiled. “Bazinga.”

He kept blinking. “But… how…”

“Look,” she beckoned him over to the computer. “See? All I did was press this key and the answer was disguised by the petition. Then all I had to do was type in the question, and voila! See? It was me.”

He stared in shock, speechless. “Penny!” was all he could manage to say.

She laughed. “Oh my God, you should have seen your face. It was to die for. You were _totally_ freaking out!”

He still appeared shocked out of his senses. Then he glared at her. “How could you not know my birthday?”

“Well, you never remind us! You said you hate celebrating birthdays! Plus, I guessed it right, didn’t I?”

“Hmm. That is true. Well, I must say, you possess a formidable amount of knowledge about me. And how on earth you managed to type the answers without me noticing, I will never comprehend. I’m impressed, Penny.”

Penny beamed. Coming from Sheldon, those words were like getting a hug from him. “See, I’m not a hopeless college undergraduate!”

He nodded. “Although there is one question that was not entirely correct.”

Penny’s smiled dropped a bit. “Which one?”

“The one about my crush. I do like somebody in a non-platonic way. But it is not simply a crush. It is much more than that.”

Penny’s eyebrows flew up. Sheldon Cooper in love with someone? Sheldon, the unable to understand relationships and unable to keep secrets guy? This was too good. “Oh? Who is it, Shelly? Anyone I know?”

Sheldon suddenly looked flustered, and avoided eye contact. _Weird._ “Penny, I think you should go now. I have to work on my paper.”

 _Oh right._ Penny shrugged, and smirked at him. “Whatever you say, string bean.” She winked and playfully pinched his cheek, then walked out the door, hearing what sounded like a relieved sigh coming from inside. _What was that all about?_

As she walked back to her apartment, she laughed, thinking that sometimes messing with Sheldon Cooper was way too easy.

“So clueless,” she muttered as she walked inside. “So, so clueless.”


End file.
